[SOLVED] another "Can you help this noob build a DAW Computer" thread

Page 2 - Seeking answers? Join the Tom's Hardware community: where nearly two million members share solutions and discuss the latest tech.

cosmicwarrior

Prominent
Dec 1, 2018
22
0
510
soundcloud.com
Greetings,
I know that this type of question gets asked a million times, but considering the fact that everything changes each year, I will venture to ask again. I know a bit about computers, but building one is a different task, with all of the variables that are available nowadays, and I’m always foggy on certain things that may be simple.My plea for help here is mainly concerning a motherboard that is best for sound quality and compatibility. I will be using this PC for music only and I do not need the top of the line most expensive parts. My budget is $1000, or maybe a bit more. Although I will be spending most of my time with samplers (I do have a ton of libraries, Kontakt and soft synths)and recording most stuff “in the box” I will also be recording multitracks (large drum set and synths)on Cubase 8. I use an older Phonic Fire wire mixer for live stuff, so I will need a slot for an old school FW card with TI chip. I have an idea of most of the components I want, including a Core i7, 3 Samsung SSD’s (500G, 1TB, 1TB) for boot drive/programs, libraries, projects. An EVGA 750 watt PS, at least 16 Gigs of Ram (maybe ripjaws?), a CD/DVD writer, I want a nice video card, but not real expensive, since its not really necessary for most music programs.
Like I mentioned, if anyone could suggest a motherboard, that is has no issues with FW, with quality sound and minimal noise, that would be nice. I’m not sure about the cpu coolers, either.
I got a few questions .Noise generated by fans, etc. will affect only live monitoring? In the box recordings are not affected, right? I’m kind of confused about where the sound “quality” actually starts? Would that be the motherboard? When I’m just composing and recording synths directly (without the mixer on) is there a difference in sound? Do I actually need to worry about a sound card, if I’m recording directly OR using the mixer?
I am tired and I probably didn’t present these questions properly, but anyway. Thanks in Advance for any help.

https://soundcloud.com/cosmic-warrior
 
Solution
In applications like video editing and, to a lesser degree, gaming, having 6 cores is going to make the system faster. You'll be able to do more things at once as well. In audio editing the work tends to be lightly threaded, as in, it doesn't use many cores. When encoding audio files single threaded speed matters. That is why I went with the i3 8350K. It only has 4 cores, but those 4 cores are pretty quick at 4 GHz. Nothing in the price bracket comes close at stock speeds and if we take into account overclocking, the 8350K will hit 4.5GHz easily. Some people have hit 5 GHz on them, but your mileage may vary on that front.

Speaking about the models there are a few things to consider. Intel has 3 recent generations of CPUs that can be...
Well, there is a lot to go through here.

The Ryzen 7 1700 is from the last generation Ryzen lineup. It is the lowest clocked Ryzen 7 model, but it is an 8 core/16 thread CPU. It is still more than enough for the vast majority of people. It can also be overclocked pretty easily to the 1700X's specs. If you need faster, for whatever reason, you'd be better off going with the 2700X which is the top model right now and the fastest Ryzen 7 to date.

The fan included with the Ryzen 7 CPUs is pretty good. The Wraith Spire is better than any budget cooler you could get.

For any of the Ryzen CPUs you can use any of the AM4 motherboards. My suggestion is to go for a motherboard with the B450 chipset. Just pick the least expensive one with all the features you want. You can't go wrong with any of them really.

Now, that said, a Ryzen 5 would probably work just as well for you. If you went for something like a 1600X, 2600, or 2600X you'd have a CPU with a good clock speed and still have 6 cores/12 threads. Any of the Ryzen 5 CPUs I've stated will have higher clock speeds than the 1700. So, you need to decide if number of cores or speed of cores is more important to you. If it is speed, go with a 1600X or 2600X, if it is cores then the 1700 will be the way to go.